EPA staff either set out to block the controversial Pebble mine by colluding with anti-mining activists, or proposed scientifically appropriate restrictions protecting southwestern Alaska from the proposal for North America's largest open-pit mine.

A federal grand jury in Anchorage handed up a 28-page indictment accusing XS Platinum and five executives of conspiring to violate the federal Clean Water Act and of falsifying compliance reports to the government

The Indian group opposing Imperial Metals Corp.'s Red Chris mine, known as the Klabona Keepers, says that nobody properly consulted its members about the project, a "grave and serious" violation of aboriginal rights.